Unique key generation

Question

I looking for a way, specifically in PHP that I will be guaranteed to always get a unique key.

I have done the following:

strtolower(substr(crypt(tim         


        

Answer 1

Any algorithm will result in duplicates.

Therefore, might I suggest that you use your existing algorithm* and simply check for duplicates?

*Slight addition: If uniqid() can be non-unique based on time, also include a global counter that you increment after every invocation. That way something is different even in the same microsecond.